Just like Dad
by ImpulsiveWriter321
Summary: While Percy and Annabeth are away at Camp Half-Blood, their four children are faced with with a blinding light...and a book. Follow along as they read through The Lightning Thief and gain knowledge about their parent's adventures...and gain respect for them as well. *Chapter 2 has been updated to fix some very embarrassing mistakes...*
1. Not When We're Faced With A Book

**Disclaimer: I do not own any characters or dialogue or plot lines that you recognize. I only own everything else. **

**So here's a little lowdown. If you have not read my other story (insert title here) then you need to know the four children – **

**Alexander Perseus Jackson – Age 16 – looks mostly like his father (dark hair, sea gray eyes) and inherited his father's water bending abilities**

**Sarah Thalia Jackson – Age 15 – looks mostly like her mother (long, curly blonde hair, blue eyes) and inherited her mother's wisdom and brains **

**Justin di Angelo Jackson – Age 10 – looks mostly like his mother (straight, wispy blonde hair, blue eyes) and inherited his mother's wisdom and brains, but also some of his father's water bending abilities**

**Elizabeth Levesque Jackson – Age 5 – looks mostly like her father (long, wavy black hair, sea gray eyes) and inherited her father's water bending abilities**

**Alex's POV**

"Alex!" I groaned. I rolled over to check the time on my clock. _6:00 a.m._ Why Dad. Why? I forced myself out of bed and didn't even bother putting on clothes. It was Saturday! I slunk down the stairs and into the kitchen where my father was putting some sodas in a cooler.

"Yeah, Dad?" He glanced at me and chuckled.

"I'm sorry, did I wake you?"

"It's six o'clock in the morning, Dad. Of course you woke me." I muttered.

"I just wanted to tell you that your mother and I are leaving in a couple minutes for camp." Now, obviously, I knew he didn't mean he and Mom were _going_ to camp. They were heading to Camp Half-Blood to help Chiron get everything ready for the upcoming summer. My siblings and I had gone every year since we were born. My parents said that they were wary of telling us at all, since we smell much stronger when we know what we are, but when I knocked over a bunch of people in the street with a wave from the kiddy pool when I was four, they decided it was better we knew. It wasn't like when they were younger and they didn't get their "powers" until they were of age. We were legacies, not demi-gods.

"Ok. You had to get me out of bed for that?" My father gave me a glare.

"You do know that you'll be taking care of things around here while we're gone, right? I don't want any funny business. No parties, no friends if we don't know about it, no water stuff," he looked pointingly at me at that one, "and Sarah is not allowed to have any boys over, understood?"

I rolled my eyes. Like Sarah had any boys to invite over.

"Right. Got it. Where's Mom?"

"Percy! The car is ready, we gotta go!" My Mom shuffled through the front door and smiled when she saw me. She walked over and gave me a large hug.

"Your father gave you the low down about this week?" She asked after she released me.

"Yeah." I yawned.

"If anything happens, you can always call us or send an Iris-message. Jason's number is also on the fridge along with Leo's, Thalia's, Frank's, Nico's, Hazel's, Piper's, Grover's – "

"Honey, I think he gets it," my Dad laughed. My Mom sighed and wrung her hands.

"I know, it's just...we've never left them alone for this long before..."

"We'll be fine, Mom. Nothing will happen, I promise." Now of course, I had no idea if I was telling the truth or not, but hey, whatever makes her feel better. It must have helped because she gave me a smile.

"Well, I'm going to say goodbye to the others and be right back down." Then my Mom disappeared up the staircase.

"Alex," I turned to find my Dad smiling sadly at me. He walked over to me and put his hands on my shoulders.

"Your mother's right. If anything happens, or you need _anything_, just call. Don't try to take anything alone." My father squeezed my shoulders and spoke slowly to emphasize his point. He had told me enough stories about his battles...and all the people he's lost.

"I won't, Dad. I promise." He sighed and gave me a breathtaking hug. Since he was the son of Poseidon, he was really REALLY strong. My Mom came back downstairs and my father took her place, taking the steps two at a time. I helped my Mom load everything into the car and then she gave me one last hug as my Dad walked down the driveway. My siblings were now standing in the doorway, waving goodbye. Mom and Dad waved back as they pulled out of the driveway. Before they left though, Dad rolled down the window and yelled,

"Stay out of trouble!" And with that, they were gone.

"Well, now that I won't be able to get back to sleep. I'm going to go read." Justin trudge back into the house, grabbing a water bottle on the way to the living room. Elizabeth glanced at the clock on the microwave and gasped.

"Dora!" She ran past Justin to the living room and turned on the T.V. Great. Now I'll have that theme song stuck in my head for the entire day.

"Might as well make this a family thing." Sarah grabbed her backpack followed our two younger siblings. I followed and made myself comfortable on the couch, opening Angry Birds on my phone.

It was quiet for a while, except for the T.V. But of course, nothing stays quiet for long when you're with the Jackson family.

It started as just a low humming noise. But then it got louder and louder, till a burst of white light illuminated the room. It went as quickly as it came and left four shaking Jackson's in its wake.

"What...was...that?" Sarah gasped, coming out from behind the couch.

"It's...it's a book." Justin slid off the chair and crawled toward the book that was laying in the middle of the floor.

"Dropped off by...light?" Elizabeth asked. Justin picked up the book and stared at the cover.

"Is it just me...or...does that look like Dad?" He showed us the book cover and I had to admit, the black hair did remind me of our father.

"It is Dad." Sarah said.

"How do we know for sure?" I asked. She pointed at the side of the book.

"Percy Jackson and the Olympians? Book one?"

"Oh. Huh."

"So...should we read it?" Justin wondered. We all were silent for a moment before Sarah stood up.

"We should call Mom and Dad."

"And tell them what? Oh, just five minutes after you left a large, blinding light filled the living room and dropped off a book with Dad's name on it?" I asked.

"Yep."

"Not happening. I'm going to prove that I'm responsible enough to handle things. And I'm not going to go running to mommy and daddy when we're faced...with a book." Sarah glared at me, but she knew I had a point. She sat back down on the couch. Elizabeth shut off the T.V. then sat next to Sarah and curled up with a pillow. Justin took his place on the chair and I simply sat on the floor, midst all of Sarah's now crumpled homework. I flipped the book open to the first page.

"Anyone want to read first?" They all just stared at me. "Alright, guess I'll go first." I cleared my throat and cracked my fingers, a habit of mine.

Then I started to read.

**Like it? Hate it? Let me know! R&R! Thanks! **


	2. Dad Slices His Old Pre Algebra Teacher

**I'm really liking Alex's POV, but I am going to switch every chapter. But for my real story (which is currently in the making), it's mostly going to switch between Percy and Alex. Just for future reference. Thanks for reading! Also, thanks to Hazle, who pointed out some (obvious, embarassing, stupid) mistakes I made. :#( **

**Alex's POV**

"Chapter one." I read. "I accidentally vaporize my pre-algebra teacher."

"What?" Sarah gasped. Justin sat forward.

"He's never told us this one," he muttered excitedly.

"Maybe for a reason..." Elizabeth hid behind the pillow a little. I shook my head to clear it and kept reading.

**Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.**

** If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.**

** Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.**

"Glad Dad isn't like most half-bloods," Sarah muttered.

"Please, he's not like most _people_," I chuckled.

**If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.**

"Do you think daddy doesn't like being a half-blood?" Elizabeth asked.

"I'm sure now he does. Doesn't he?" Justin looked to me for an answer.

"He probably likes the power...just not the danger."

"Dad's pretty good in the face of danger considering the stories we've heard." Sarah shot back.

"What about the danger to us?" Justin replied. That shut us all up.

"Just keep reading," Sarah mumbled.

**But if you recognize yourself in these pages – if you feel something stirring inside –stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before **_**they **_**sense it too, and they'll come for you.**

** Don't say I didn't warn you.**

"He's being a little...dramatic. Isn't he?" I wondered aloud.

"Maybe...maybe not." Sarah replied.

**My name is Percy Jackson.**

** I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.**

"Troubled kids? Way to go, pops. Way to go." Justin laughed. We couldn't help but join in. Our father was an...interesting man.

"Stop it. That's our father you're speaking about." Sarah scolded. But even she couldn't keep the smile off her face.

**Am I a troubled kid?**

** Yeah. You could say that.**

"See? Even he thinks so." Sarah smacked him before he could say anything else.

**I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan – twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.**

"Oh gods. I'm so sorry, Dad." I muttered.

"Dad probably thought it was very interesting." Sarah said. Ever since she learned what we were, she LOVED learning more about Greek and Roman mythology. And yeah, it's cool stuff, but it's kind of repetitive.

**I know – it sounds like torture. **

I raised an eyebrow at Sarah.

**Most Yancy field trips were.**

** But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.**

** Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair.**

All of our heads shot up.

"Chiron!" Elizabeth cried. She had grown fond of the centaur since the first moment she met him. Why, I have no idea.

**He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.**

"He can no longer get mad at me when he gets a phone call from my teachers complaining about how I fall asleep in class." I muttered.

**I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.**

** Boy, was I wrong.**

**See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway.**

"Dad...shot a school bus? With a Revolutionary War cannon? That, is the coolest thing ever!" I laughed.

"That's horrible..." Sarah gasped.

"He got expelled? No wonder he never talks about his past schooling." Justin shook his head and smiled.

"It was loaded?" Elizabeth's question caught us. Why was it loaded? Ah, well. Knowing Dad, if it hadn't been loaded, he would have accidentally done something else with it.

**And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim.**

"Ha! I gotta give Dad props for these...I never knew he was a wild child." I snickered.

"He had no idea what he was doing. These are complete accidents - " Sarah tried to explain. I ignored her and kept reading.

**And the time before that...Well, you get the idea.**

** This trip, I was determined to be good.**

** All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and - ketchup sandwich.**

"Aw...poor Grover," Elizabeth pouted.

"Peanut butter and ketchup?" Justin made a face.

**Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a not excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

"Oh, Grover," I chuckled. Our Uncle Grover was known for eating the most at any occasion. Even if he was just stopping by the house.

**Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.**

Justin suddenly burst out laughing.

"What?" I asked.

"He's...you...you are so much like him!" I narrowed my eyes in confusion but then it clicked. My Dad was saying that to be entertaining, it had to be bad or embarrassing...yeah, that about summed me up in a nutshell.

"So, you're going to be just like him when you grow up." Sarah smirked. I paled, and went back to the book.

**"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.**

** Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."**

** He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.**

"Get her, daddy." Elizabeth muttered.

**"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.**

** "You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."**

** Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there.**

"You should have. That would have been _so _awesome," I said.

**In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.**

** Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.**

** He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.**

** It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.**

"Probably longer. They say that – " Sarah started.

"Blah blah blah blah blah...blah." I interrupted. She glared, but I just kept reading.

** He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave maker, a **_**stele**_**, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.**

** Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.**

"A fifty year old wearing a leather jacket? Now...I'm not much of a girly girl, but even I know that is _not_ okay," Sarah laughed.

"Was Yancy so bad that the math teacher actually had a nervous breakdown? How bad could these kids be?" I scoffed.

"Have you been to a boarding school? You know how many of those kids are actually demi-gods or legacies?" Justin reminded me.

"Yeah, I guess," I mumbled.

** From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.**

"That's so...scary!" Elizabeth hid behind her pillow again.

** One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real series, and said, "You're absolutely right."**

"Oh Grover...never could keep a secret," Justin laughed.

** Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art. **

** Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you**_** shut up**_**?"**

** It came out louder than I meant it to.**

"Doesn't everything? Literally, the man is incapable of whispering." Sarah shook her head and smiled.

** The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.**

** "Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"**

** My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."**

** Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"**

** I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"**

"Ew. I still hate that story." Sarah's nose scrunched up.

"It's the entire basis of Greek mythology. Our heritage. And you hate the story?" Justin asked.

"It's just...gross."

"So is our Mom being born out of Athena's head." I snickered.

"Okay, read on, read on," Sarah closed her eyes tight, motioning for me to read on.

** "Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because..."**

** "Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and –"**

"God? Nice one, Dad," Justin said.

"He corrects himself..." I stood up for my father a bit, because he was sounding more and more like me. Or I was sounding more and more like him...or...you get the point.

** "God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

** "Titan," I corrected myself. "And...he didn't rust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat inside. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters – "**

** "Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

"See? I'm not the only one." Sarah clipped.

** "- and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."**

** Some snickers from the group.**

** Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend. "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"**

** "And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"**

** "Busted," Grover muttered.**

** "Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

** At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who every caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.**

** I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

** "I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

** The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.**

** Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."**

** I knew that was coming.**

** I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

** Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go – intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.**

** "You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

** "About the Titans?"**

** "About real life. And how your studies apply to it."**

"Ah. So that's where Dad got started on teaching us how to "use our studies for real life." I groaned. It was horrible sometimes the way he taught us. The days when we learned how to fight were full of fun, but the days he tried to teach us life lessons and how to apply our knowledge to real life situations were...boring. For me, at least.

** "Oh."**

** "What you learn from me," he said. "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best for you, Percy Jackson."**

I felt like I was kicked in the gut. Dad always said the same thing to me. To all of us, actually.

** I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

"Oh yeah. You are so like dad." Sarah laughed.

** I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and named every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life. No – he didn't expect me to be **_**as good**_**; he expected me to be **_**better**_**. And I just couldn't learn all those names and faces, much less spell the correctly.**

** I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.**

"He probably was..." Elizabeth murmured sadly. There was a moment of silence as we digested that, then I cleared my throat and continued.

** He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.**

** The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.**

** Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds black than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I would've have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.**

"Snow storms? Flooding? Lightning strikes? Okay, that last one has got to be Zeus," Justin muttered.

"Well, Great-Uncle Zeus always did like to make an entrance," Sarah chuckled.

"Did? He still does," we laughed a bit at our Great-Uncle's expense when suddenly a large flash enveloped the living room and rain started pelting the windows. I muttered a quick apology.

** Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.**

** Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from **_**that**_** school – the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.**

"You can make it elsewhere, Dad..." I muttered.

"What did you say?" Sarah asked.

"Nothing, nothing..." I read on.

** "Detention?" Grover asked.**

** "Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean – I'm not a genius."**

"But you made one," Justin smirked. You could call Justin a genius. He got a lot of Mom's genes, which meant he got a lot of Athena's. He was easily the smartest out of us, but not the most physically able. That was me.

** Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

We all started laughing hysterically at that. We had heard our Dad and Uncle Grover have the weirdest conversations ever, and I guess it started a while back.

** I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it. I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.**

"Grandma..." Elizabeth whined. We hadn't seen our grandma in a long time, because we're never able to make it up for major holidays. Either something is going on around our end, monsters and such, or grandma is doing something with grandpa Paul. I knew Paul wasn't my real grandpa, Poisdeon was, but Paul has been in my life for as long as I can remember, so he's still grandpa to me.

** Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized café table.**

** I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends – I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists – and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.**

** "Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

"Liquid Cheetos? Okay, now I know where I get my amazing comebacks," I laughed.

"Amazing? Try demoralizing and stupid," Sarah grinned.

"You're demoralizing and stupid," I muttered.

** I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.**

** I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"**

** Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.**

** Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see – "**

** " – the water – "**

** " – like it grabbed her – "**

** I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

"Go Daddy!" Elizabeth yelled, pumping her little fist in the air. Justin and Sarah were grinning ear to ear and I laughed.

** As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey – "**

** "I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."**

** That wasn't the right thing to say.**

** "Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.**

** "Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. **_**I**_** pushed her."**

** I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.**

** She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

** "I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.**

** "But – "**

** "You –**_**will**_** – stay –here."**

"Whoa. Creepy." Justin muttered.

"Sounds like a monster," Sarah mumbled thoughtfully.

"Let's see," I stated.

** Grover looked at me desperately.**

** "It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."**

** "Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "**_**Now**_**."**

** Nancy Bobofit smirked.**

** I gave her my deluxe I'll – kill – you – later stare.**

Which is the scariest thing..._ever_. I've never been given the death glare, but one time when a gorgon got loose in our house, it cornered Elizabeth in a corner. She screamed and my Dad had turned the corner and saw it. That gorgon got the look, and boy, did it ever look scared. That was the first time I had ever seen the look, and even though it wasn't directed at me, I was shaking in my shoes.

** Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.**

** How'd she get there so fast?**

** I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.**

"Thanks for that, by the way. The ADHD is awesome," I muttered. I had it the worst. I got in trouble the most, I had dylesixa...well, my siblings did, too, but not as bad as me. It got so bad in the fourth grade that I couldn't even read my own name on a piece of paper.

** I wasn't so sure.**

** I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

** Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.**

** I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.**

** Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.**

** But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

** I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.**

** Except for us, the gallery was empty.**

** Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**

"Dad...get out. Now." Sarah gasped.

"He can't hear you," I said.

** Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...**

** "You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

** I didn't the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

** She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?" **

** The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

** She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.**

** I said, "I'll – I'll try harder, ma'am."**

** Thunder shook the building.**

** "We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."**

** I didn't know what she was talking about.**

** All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on **_**Tom Sawyer**_** from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away me grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.**

I had to stop for a good minute to laugh at that. The funny thing was, I had done the _same thing_. Great minds think alike.

** "Well?" she demanded.**

** "Ma'am, I don't..."**

** "Your time is up," she hissed.**

** Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

** Then things got even stranger.**

** Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

** "What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.**

** Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

** With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword – Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.**

** Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes. **

** My knees were jelly. I hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

** She snarled, "Die, honey!" **

** And she flew straight at me.**

"Get her Daddy! Get her!" Elizabeth yelled and leaned forward so that she almost fell off the couch.

** Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

** The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. **_**Hisss**_**!**

** Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me. **

** I was alone.**

** There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

** Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me. **

** My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.**

** Had I imagined the whole thing?**

** I went back outside.**

** It had started to train.**

** Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."**

** I said, "Who?"**

** "Our **_**teacher**_**. Duh!"**

** I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.**

** She just rolled her eyes and turned away.**

** I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

** He said, "Who?"**

** But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

** "Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."**

** Thunder boomed overhead.**

** I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.**

** I went over to him.**

** He looked up, a little distracted, "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."**

** I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.**

** "Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

** He stared at me blankly. "Who?"**

** "The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."**

** He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling alright?"**

"And that, is the end of chapter one," I said, lowering the book.

"That's so crazy, how did no one know?" Elizabeth gasped.

"The mist. Grover and Chiron just bluffed," Justin explained.

"I don't know about you guys, but I'm dying to hear the next chapter," Sarah practically bounced up and down in her chair.

"Would you like to read then?" I raised an eyebrow, handing her the book.

"Yes!" She grabbed it from my grasp and settled back into the cushions. I glanced at the clock and saw 7:00 flashing. It was going to be a _long_ day.

**Well? What did you all think? Should I continue? If anyone was confused: Yes, I will be making a separate story for them, but that's still in planning and I have other chapters of other stories I would like to complete before school starts on the fourth...but I would love some feedback! Thank you!**


	3. The Socks of Death

**Thanks for the reviews and the views! Also, I made another little mistake on the last chapter. Alex woke up at 6:00 and I don't think it would take 4 hours to read a chapter...whoops. Also, I'm laughing so hard right now becuase they put Grover's number in Skype form on here. I don't know how it happened, but I wouldn't recommend clicking on it. XD Unless you want to see where it leads.**

**Sarah's POV**

** I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly. This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle. For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some kind of trick on me. The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr – a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip – had been our pre-algebra teacher since Christmas.**

** Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho.**

** It got so I almost believed them – Mrs. Dodds had never existed.**

** Almost.**

** But Grover couldn't fool me. When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying.**

** Something was going on. Something **_**had**_** happened at the museum.**

** I didn't have much time to think about it during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat.**

"Jeez, poor Dad," Justin grimaced.

** The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year.**

** I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time.**

Alex snickered.

"What?" I asked, glancing up at him.

"Now he's sounding like you," he said.

"Hey! I am not cranky and irritable!" I spit.

"You are during that time of the month..." Justin muttered and Alex burst out laughing.

"Time of the month?" Elizabeth looked up at me with big questioning eyes.

"Nothing to worry about, Elizabeth. Ask mom. And for your information," I glared at my brothers, "almost all girls get cranky and irritable during that time of the month." And with that I quickly resumed reading.

** My grades slipped from Ds to Fs. I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.**

** Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. I called him an old sot. I wasn't even sure what it meant, but it sounded good.**

"Old sot! I've gotta use that one!" Alex exclaimed.

"Say it to, Dad. See what he says," Justin chuckled.

** The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy.**

** Fine, I told myself. Just fine.**

** I was homesick.**

** I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties.**

"Oh yeah, Dad told us about him...what was his name? Gale...?" Alex thought.

"Gabe. His name was Gabe," I remembered.

** And yet... there were things I'd miss at Yancy. The view of the woods out my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend, even if he was a little strange. I worried how he'd survive next year without me. **

** I'd miss Latin class, too – Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well.**

** As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for. I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him.**

"You should believe him," I whispered.

** The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the **_**Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology**_** across my dorm room. Words had started swimming off the pages, circling my head, the letters doing one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon, or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it.**

"He knows how I feel like...every night. He should seriously cut me some slack." Alex moaned and flopped on his back.

** I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt. **

** I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes. **_**I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson.**_

** I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book.**

** I'd never asked a teacher for help before. Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried.**

"Aw, that's the Daddy I know," Elizabeth smiled.

** I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor. **

** I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said "...worried about Percy, sir."**

** I froze. **

** I'm not usually an eavesdropper, but I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult.**

"Or your siblings..." Alex spat.

** I inched closer.**

** "...alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the **_**school**_**! Now that we know for sure, and **_**they**_** know too – "**

** "We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more."**

"Mature more?" Justin scoffed. "Dad was probably way more mature than everyone in that school. And a young person can be mature; I mean, look at me!" Justin crossed his arms and slumped back into the chair. Maturity was a sore spot for him. Being so young, people had a hard time believing that he was so intelligent. Then when he proved he was as mature and intelligent as a 20 year old man, they usually either laughed in his face and called him a liar or pushed him down and called him a geek. I smiled sadly at him.

** "But he may not have time. The summer solstice deadline – "**

** "Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can.**

** "Sir, he **_**saw**_** her..."**

** "His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that."**

"His imagination," Alex repeated. "Dad's not _that_ stupid."

** "Sir, I...I can't fail in my duties again." Grover's voice was choked with emotion. "You know what that would mean."**

** "You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall – "**

** The mythology book dropped out of my hand and hit the floor with a thud.**

** Mr. Brunner went silent.**

** My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall. **

** A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow.**

** I opened the nearest door and slipped inside.**

** A few seconds later I heard a slow **_**clop-clop-clop**_**, like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, then moved on.**

** A bead of sweat trickled down my neck.**

** Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice."**

** "Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn..."**

** "Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You're got a long day of exams tomorrow."**

** "Don't remind me."**

** The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office. **

** I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever. **

** Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm. **

**Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam notes like he'd been there all night. **

** "Hey," he said, bleary-eyed. "You going to be ready for this test?"**

** I didn't answer.**

** "You look awful." He frowned. "Is everything okay?"**

** "Just...tired."**

** I turned so he couldn't read my expression, and started getting ready for bed.**

** I didn't understand what I'd heard downstairs. I wanted to believe I imagined the whole thing.**

** But one thing was clear: Grover and Mr. Brunner were talking about me behind my back. They thought I was in some kind of danger.**

** The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam, my eyes swimming with all the Greek and Roman names I'd misspelled, Mr. Brunner called me back inside.**

** For a moment, I was worried he'd found out about my eavesdropping the night before, but that didn't seem to be the problem.**

** "Percy," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's...it's for the best."**

"For the best?" I wondered.

** His tone was kind, but the words still embarrassed me. Even though he was speaking quietly, the other kids finishing the test could hear. Nancy Bobofit smirked at me and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips. **

** I mumbled, "Okay, sir."**

** "I mean..." Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn't sure what to say. "This isn't the right place for you. It was only a matter of time."**

"Hey!" Justin yelled.

"He can't just..." I started.

"Dad should've kicked his – " Alex trailed.

"Daddy..." Tears sprang to Elizabeth's eyes.

** My eyes stung.**

** Here was my favorite teacher, in front of the class, telling me I couldn't handle it. After saying he believed in me all year, now he was telling me I was destined to get kicked out.**

** "Right," I said, trembling.**

** "No, no," Mr. Brunner said. "Oh, confound it all. What I'm trying to say...you're not normal, Percy. That's nothing to be – "**

** "Thanks," I blurted. "That's a lot sir, for reminding me."**

** "Percy – "**

** But I was already gone.**

"Poor Dad. Doesn't even know what he is and people all around him are telling him he's not normal," Justin muttered.

"That's how it was for all demi-gods, though. They had no idea what they were before either someone told them or a monster attacked." I reminded him. "Dad wasn't the only one. Mr. Br- Chiron...was just trying to console him."

"By calling him a loser." Alex huffed.

"He didn't –" I stopped. I just kept reading as Alex cooled down.

** On the last day of the term, I shoved my clothes into my suitcase.**

** The other guys were joking around, talking about their vacation plans. One of them was going on a hiking trip to Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were juvenile delinquents, like me, but they were **_**rich**_** juvenile delinquents. Their daddies were executives, or ambassadors, or celebrities. I was a nobody, from a family of nobodies.**

I glanced around at our brilliant house. Mom had designed it, of course, and it was beautiful. Mom and Dad had somehow gotten enough money to pay for everything, and I had always wondered how they did it. I didn't think you'd get a big paycheck just for being a demi-god. But I had overheard stories from others – how my father did all these amazing things with my mother and others by his side. Could those be true? If they were, well, my father definitely wasn't a "nobody" anymore.

** They asked me what I'd be doing this summer and I told them I was going back to the city.**

** What I didn't tell them was that I'd have to get a summer job walking dogs or selling magazine subscriptions, and spend my free time worrying about where I'd go to school in the fall.**

** "Oh," one of the guys said, "That's cool."**

** They went back to their conversation as if I'd never existed.**

** The only person I dreaded saying good-bye to was Grover, but as it turned out, I didn't have to. He'd booked a ticket to Manhattan on the same Greyhound as I had, so there we were, together again, heading into the city.**

** During the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers. It occurred to me that he'd always acted nervous and fidgety when we left Yancy, as if he expected something bad to happen. Before, I'd always assumed he was worried about getting teased. But there was nobody to tease him on the Greyhound.**

"Does he want to be caught? I thought you were supposed to "play it cool" in the possibility of danger," Justin recited from one of our lessons. Our father always said that if we believed something dangerous was around, we would act cool and find someone who could help. Don't run away screaming, unless it comes up behind you and scares the crap out of you, but he hadn't said that. That was my interpretation. And never, _ever_, engage in a fight.

"You can't blame Grover for being terrified," Alex responded. "There was a Kindly One at the school, and nobody noticed."

"True," Justin pondered.

** Finally, I couldn't stand it anymore.**

** I said, "Looking for Kindly Ones?"**

** Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. "Wha – what do you mean?"**

** I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the night before the exam.**

** Grover's eye twitched. "How much did you hear?"**

** "Oh...not much. What's the summer solstice deadline?"**

** He winced. "Look, Percy...I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teachers..."**

** "Grover – "**

** "And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were overstressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and..."**

** "Grover, you're a really, really bad liar."**

** His ears turned pink.**

** From his shirt pocket, he fished out a grubby business card. "Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer."**

** The card was in fancy script, which was murder on my dyslexic eyes, but I finally made out something like:**

**Grover Underwood**

**Keeper**

**Half-Blood Hill**

**Long Island, New York**

**(800) 009-0009**

** "What's Half – "**

** "Don't say it aloud!" he yelped. "That's my, um...summer address."**

I knew what was coming before they even said it.

"Half-Blood Hill. Half-Blood Hill. Half-Blood Hill." Alex and Justin chanted.

"See? Nothing happens." Justin chuckled.

"That's not what he meant, idiots. If someone _was_ on that bus, and knew they were from Half-Blood Hill? What do you think would have happened?" I scolded.

"Dad and Grover would have kicked they're ass," Alex said. I smiled. He was right. Our Dad was a skilled fighter, even back then it seemed.

** My heart sank. Grover had a summer home. I'd never considered that his family might be as rich as the others at Yancy.**

** "Okay," I said glumly. "So, like, if I want to come visit your mansion."**

"Grover has a mansion?" Elizabeth inquired.

"No, no, Dad was just making assumptions." I responded.

"Oh." Elizabeth sunk back into her pillow.

** He nodded. "Or...or if you need me."**

** "Why would I need you?"**

** It came out harsher than I meant it to.**

** Grover blushed right down to his Adam's apple. "Look, Percy, the truth is, I – I kind of have to protect you." **

** I stared at him.**

** All year long, I'd gotten in fights, keep bullies away from him. I'd lost sleep worrying that he'd get beaten up next year without me. And here he was acting like he was the one who defended **_**me**_**.**

** "Grover," I said. "What exactly are you protecting me from?"**

** There was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell like rotten eggs. **

"Worst. Smell. Ever." Justin gagged.

**The driver cursed and limped the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.**

** After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we'd all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else.**

** We were on a stretch of country road – no place you'd notice if you didn't break down there. On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the other side, across four lands of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.**

** The stuff on sale looked really good: heaping boxes of bloodred cherries and apples, walnuts and apricots, jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub full of ice. There were no customers, just tree old ladies sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting the biggest pair of socks I'd ever seen.**

** I mean these socks were the size of sweaters, but they were clearly socks. The lady on the right knitted one of them. The lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric - blue yarn.**

"Leave it to Dad to go off on socks," Alex laughed.

** Al three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses.**

** The weirdest thing was, they seemed to be looking right at me.**

** I looked over at Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained from his face. His nose was twitching.**

** "Grover?" I said. "Hey, man – "**

** "Tell me they're not looking at you. They are, aren't they?"**

** "Yeah. Weird, huh? You think those socks would fit me?"**

** "Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all."**

** The old lady in the middle took out a large pair of scissors – gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath.**

"No!" I gasped.

** "We're getting on the bus," he told me. "Come on."**

** "What?" I said. "It's like a thousand degrees in there."**

** "Come on!" He pried open the door and climbed inside, but I stayed back.**

** Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle one cut the yarn, and I swear I could hear that **_**snip**_** across four lanes of traffic.**

"Oh no..." Justin realized.

"But that couldn't have been his yarn...he's still alive." Alex insisted.

"Then...who's was it?" Elizabeth asked. No one had an answer.

** Her two friends balled up the electric-blue socks, leaving me wondering who they could possibly be for – Sasquatch or Godzilla.**

** At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life.**

** The passengers cheered.**

** "Darn right!" yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. "Everybody back on board!" **

** Once we got going, I started feeling feverish, as if I'd caught the flu.**

** Grover didn't look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering.**

** "Grover?"**

** "Yeah?"**

** "What are you not telling me?"**

** He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?"**

** "You mean the old ladies? What is it about them, man? They're not like...Mrs. Dodds, are they?"**

** His expression was hard to read, but I got the feeling that the fruit-stand ladies were something much, much worse than Mrs. Dodds He said, "Just tell me what you saw."**

** "The middle one took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn."**

** He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers that might've been crossing himself, but it wasn't. It was something else, something almost – older.**

** He said, "You saw her snip the cord."**

** "Yeah. So?" But even as I said it, I knew it was big deal.**

** "This is not happening," Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. "I don't want this to be like the last time."**

"Last time?" We all repeated.

** "What last time?"**

** "Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth."**

** "Grover," I said, because he was really starting to scare me. "What are you talking about?"**

** "Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me."**

** This seemed like a strange request to me, but I promised he could.**

** "Is this like a superstition or something?" I asked.**

** No answer.**

** "Grover – that snipping of the yarn. Does that mean somebody is going to die?"**

** He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I'd like best on my coffin.**

"And that's chapter two," I put the book down as we all sat in silence for a moment. If it wasn't Dad's cord they cut...then who's did they cut? I knew there were so many lives lost in the Second Great Titan War, and that yarn could have been for anyone. But the fact that Dad _saw _it happen...it had to have been for someone important. Right?

Suddenly, before anyone could speak, Alex's phone started buzzing. He picked it up and his face went white as he read the Caller ID.

"Alex?" I asked.

"It's Dad. What do I say?" He fumbled.

"Just say we're fine. We don't need to worry him over a book, remember?" Justin said. Alex nodded and answered the call.

"Hey, Dad...yeah, we're fine. You're already at camp?" I looked at the clock to see it was 11:52. We had been reading longer than I thought.

"Yeah, yeah, okay. Yes, Dad, we're _fine,_" Alex stressed.

"Bye, love you, too." Alex hung up the phone and gently threw it on the ground.

"I still think we should tell them. It's not like they're going to race home because of a book," I stated.

"No, but they may race home because of the way it was delivered." Justin pointed out. I just groaned. There was no way I was going to get my way.

"Can I read?" Justin asked. I passed the book to him and he flipped the page.

**Thanks for reading! R&R! **


	4. Uncle Grover Without Pants

**Thanks for the reviews! And I will try to get more dialogue from the characters in there. There other chapters I wrote at like...one in the morning, but this one is being written at noon, so hopefully my brain will think of more things. Also, I'm so sorry this is so late...I have a one word excuse...school. So please bare with me as I write, because updates may come a little later than before...**

**Justin's POV**

** Confession time: I ditched Grover as soon as we got to the bus terminal. **

"Dad..."Alex groaned. "Why are you stupid...?" We all got a good laugh out of that one.

** I know, I know. It was rude. **

"Yes it was. Grover was probably freaking out over him!" Sarah exclaimed.

"You sound like mom," I chuckled.

"Because other than mom, I'm the only one who takes other people's feelings into consideration," She snapped. Alex scoffed.

** But Grover was freaking me out, looking at me like I was a dead man, muttering, "Why does this always happen?" and "Why does it always have to be sixth grade?"**

"I would be scared, too. I don't blame, daddy." Elizabeth said. I didn't either, but it was still a stupid thing to do.

** Whenever he got upset, Grover's bladder acted up, so I wasn't surprised when, as soon as we got off the bus, he made me promise to wait for him, then made a beeline for the restroom. Instead of waiting, I got my suitcase, slipped outside, and caught the first taxi uptown. **

** "East One-hundred – and – fourth and First," I told the driver.**

** A word about my mother, before you meet her.**

** Her name is Sally Jackson and she's the best person in the world,**

"Yes, she is. Is she coming for Christmas?" I looked up.

"I think so...?" Sarah mumbled.

"If she is, I hope she brings us candy. Blue candy." Alex sighed.

"Candy! Candy!" Elizabeth giggled. I smiled at my sister's excitement and kept reading.

** which just proves my theory that the best people have the rottenest luck. Her own parents died in a plane crash when she was five, and she was raised by an uncle who didn't care much about her. She wanted to be a novelist, so she spent high school working to save enough money for a college with a good creative-writing program. Then her uncle got cancer, and she had to quit school her senior year to take care of him. After he died, she was left with no money, no family, and no diploma.**

"She's intelligent. If I didn't know better I'd say she was a daughter of Athena," Sarah said smugly.

"Please, grandma doesn't have to be a goddess's daughter to be intelligent," I stated. I remembered when she would come over and quiz me to help me study for my spelling tests. She would always make me first spell the word, tell her what it meant, and how to correctly use it in a sentence. I always aced my spelling tests and I learned new ways to use the word. I smiled at the memory.

** The only good break she ever got was meeting my dad.**

** I don't have any memories of him, just this sort of warm glow, maybe the barest trace of his smile. My mom doesn't like to talk about him because it makes her sad. She has no pictures.**

"Poor grandpa. Couldn't grandma put one picture of him up?" Elizabeth asked.

"And have dad know what he looked like? Probably even that would have been dangerous. It's also probably why Dad doesn't keep any pictures of us in his wallet," Alex mused.

"He doesn't?" I asked.

"No. His wallet is something he keeps on him at all times, if the wrong person got a hold of it..." He trailed. Ah, makes sense.

** See, they weren't married. She told me he was rich and important, and their relationship was a secret. Then one day, he set sail across the Atlantic on some important journey, and he never came back.**

"Set sail? More like he went _into_ the Atlantic..." Sarah giggled.

** Lost at sea, my mom told me. Not dead. Lost at sea.**

Lost at sea. He actually _is_ the sea...but I'm just being picky.

** She worked odd jobs, took night classes to get her high-school diploma, and raised me on her own. She never complained or got mad. Not even once. But I knew I wasn't an easy kid.**

** Finally, she married Gabe Ugliano,**

"Ew. Even his _name_ sounds...ugly," Elizabeth wrinkled her nose like she had smelled Alex's gym socks.

"That's original, Liz," I laughed. Her bright, sea-green eyes narrowed toward me.

"Don't. Call. Me. Liz." She said. She hated when people nicknamed her. The only nickname she allowed was "princess" from Dad and "pumpkin" from Mom. If we tried to call her something, she'd hit us. And that _is_ a _threat._ Don't let her size or age fool you, she was lethal to those that weren't kind to her or the ones she loves. What she lacks in size she makes up for in agility and her mind, most of the time, was like a teenager's.

** who was nice the first thirty seconds we knew him, then showed his true colors as a world-class jerk. When I was young, I nicknamed him Smelly Gabe. **

"Mhm!" Alex tried to, unsuccessfully, stifle his laugh. Leave it to Dad to come up with a nickname like that.

** I'm sorry, but it's the truth. The guy reeked like moldy garlic pizza wrapped in gym shorts.**

"To mask him," Sarah said suddenly. "Grandma needed a way to mask Dad's scent so that monsters couldn't find him."

** Between the two of us, we made my mom's life pretty hard. The way Smelly Gabe treated her, the way he and I got along...well, when I came home is a good example.**

** I walked into our little apartment, hoping my mom would be home from work. Instead, Smelly Gabe was in the living room, playing poker with his buddies. The television blared ESPN. Chips and beer cans were strewn all over the carpet. **

I looked around at our practically spotless home. Mom made sure to vacuum every week and Dad pitched in by using his power to wash the floors about three times a year. As I looked, my eyes fell on one of our many family pictures. It was the one that went on our Christmas card. As a joke, we all dressed in the ugliest Christmas sweaters and wore Santa hats. We had goofy grins and bright eyes, and our backdrop was the large Christmas tree that we always put in the corner of the living room. I smiled. My father may not have had the best childhood, but maybe that was the reason he created a wonderful and memorable one for us.

"Justin?"

I looked up to find all eyes on me. Sarah was shaking my knee. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah...yeah I am," I cleared my head and read again.

** Hardly looking up, he said around his cigar, "So, you're home."**

** "Where's my mom?"**

** "Working," he said. "You got any cash?"**

** That was it. No **_**Welcome back. Good to see you. How has your life been the last six months?**_

** Gabe had put on weight. He looked like a tuskless walrus in thrift-store clothes.**

"Hey...I got my last shirt at a thrift-store..." Sarah muttered.

** He had about three hairs on his head, all combed over his bald scalp, as if that made him handsome or something.**

** He managed the Electronics Mega-Mart in Queens, but he stayed home most of the time. I don't know why he hadn't been fired long before. He just kept on collecting paychecks, spending the money on cigars that made me nauseous, and on beer, of course. Always beer. Whenever I was home, he expected me to provide his gambling funds. He called that our "guy secret." Meaning, if I told my mom, he would punch my lights out.**

I gripped the book tighter. How did Dad not punch him sooner?

** "I don't have any cash," I told him.**

** He raised a greasy eyebrow.**

** Gabe could sniff out money like a bloodhound, which was surprising, since his own smell should've covered up everything else.**

"Like daddy!" Elizabeth exclaimed. Like I said..._most of the time_ her brain was like a teenager.

** "You took a taxi from the bus station," he said. "Probably paid with a twenty. Got six, seven bucks in change. Somebody expects to live under this roof, he ought to carry his own weight. Am I right, Eddie?"**

"Whoa. Jerk much?" Sarah rolled her eyes and sunk back into the couch.

"I hope Dad kicks him where it hurts..." Alex muttered.

** Eddie, the super of the apartment building, looked at me with a twinge of sympathy. "Come on, Gabe," he said. "The kid just got here."**

** "Am I **_**right**_**?" Gabe repeated.**

** Eddie scowled into his bowl of pretzels. The other two guys passed gas in harmony.**

"Why would the _super_ listen to a guy who _lived_ in his apartments?! He totally could have kicked Gabe to the curb!" I exclaimed.

"Poker. Money. He's stupid," Sarah listed.

** "Fine," I said. I dug a wad of dollars out of my pocket and threw the money on the table. "I hope you lose."**

** "Your report card came, brain boy!" he shouted after me. "I wouldn't act so snooty!"**

Alex tensed at that. His eyes narrowed and he tightened his hands into fists. His report cards were probably the worst out of all of ours, but I knew he tried hard. Mom and Dad knew, too, which was way they never got after him for it, but it was still a sad situation for him. That didn't mean I liked him all the time, I mean, he's still my annoying older brother. I'm not going soft.

** I slammed the door to my room, which really wasn't my room. During school months, it was Gabe's "study." He didn't study anything in there except old car magazines, but he loved shoving my stuff in the closet, leaving his muddy boots on my windowsill, and doing his best to make the place smell like his nasty cologne and cigars and stale beer.**

"Ewwww..." Elizabeth said.

"Can this guy get any worse?" I asked.

** I dropped my suitcase on the bed. Home sweet home. **

** Gabe's smell was almost worse than the nightmares about Mrs. Dodds, or the sound of that old fruit lady's shears snipping the yarn.**

** But as soon as I thought that, my legs felt weak. I remembered Grover's look of panic – how he'd made me promise I wouldn't go home without him. A sudden chill rolled through me. I felt like someone –s something – was looking for me right now, maybe pounding its way up the stairs, growing long, horrible talons.**

"Now that...is a scary thought," I shivered. My siblings nodded in agreement.

** Then I heard my mom's voice. "Percy?"**

** She opened the bedroom door, and my fears melted. My mother can make me feel good just be walking into the room. Her eyes sparkle and change color in the light. Her smile is as warm as a quilt. She's got a few gray streaks mixed in with her long brown hair, but I never think of her as old. When she looks at me, it's like she's seeing all the good things about me, none of the bad. I've never heard her raise her voice or say an unkind word to anyone, not even me or Gabe.**

"Aww...grandma!" Elizabeth squealed.

"Dad's so cute. I doubt any twelve year old boy would say that about their mother..." Sarah smiled.

"I know I did," Alex whispered. Our mom may was the best person in the world according to our standards. She was smart, quick, funny, kind, caring, and most of all loving. She and Dad worked well together...they swore to protect us and give us happy healthy lives, which is much more than what some demigods get unfortunately.

** "Oh, Percy." She hugged me tight. "I can't believe it. You've grown since Christmas!" **

"Yeah seriously. That gene passed down to me, I can't stop growing!" Alex, at sixteen, was only a couple inches below Dad. Since our father was about 6'0, Alex was around 5'9.

** Her red-white-and-blue Sweet on America uniform smelled like the best things in the world: chocolate, licorice, and all the other stuff she sold at the candy shop in Grand Central. She'd brought me a huge bag of "free samples" the way she always did when I came home.**

"Like she does when she visits us!" Elizabeth slid off the couch and ran upstairs to where our bedrooms were. When she came back down, she had a large bag of our grandma's "free samples". Our grandmother did not work at the shop anymore...she _owned_ the shop after she published some of her books and got paid a _lot_ of money. So she was able to send us large bags whenever she wanted, which was perfectly fine with us.

** We sat together on the edge of the bed. While I attacked the blueberry sour strings, **

"My favorite..." Alex mumbled, biting into one that Elizabeth threw to him.

** she ran her hand through my hair and demanded to know everything I hadn't put in my letters. She didn't mention anything about my getting expelled. She didn't seem to care about that. But was I okay? Was her little boy doing all right?**

"Now we know where Dad gets it," I smiled. Dad never worried about our grades. Well, he _worried, _but we had the advantage of two parents who went through dyslexia and ADHD during school. As long as we were trying, we passed in their books.

** I told her she was smothering me, and to lay off and all that, but secretly, I was really, really glad to see her.**

** From the other room, Gabe yelled, "Hey, Sally – how about some bean dip, huh?"**

"Yep. He got worse." Elizabeth muttered.

** I gritted my teeth.**

** My mom is the nicest lady in the world. She should've been married to a millionaire, not to some jerk like Gabe.**

"Or a god..." I chuckled.

** For her sake, I tried to sound upbeat about my last days at Yancy Academy. I told her I wasn't too down about the expulsion. I'd lasted almost the whole year this time. I'd made some new friends. I'd done pretty well in Latin. And honestly, the fights hadn't been as bad as the headmaster said. I like Yancy Academy. I really did. I put such a good spin on the year, I almost convinced myself. I started choking up, thinking about Grover and Mr. Brunner. Even Nancy Bobofit suddenly didn't seem so bad.**

** Until that trip to the museum...**

** "What?" my mom asked. Her eyes tugged at my conscience, trying to pull out the secrets. "Did something scare you?"**

** "No, Mom."**

** I felt bad lying.**

"He should. Grandma has a right to know," Sarah declared.

"Would you tell Mom if you didn't know what you were and some crazy bird thing attacked you?" Alex raised an eyebrow.

"Well...um...no."

"Thought so."

**I wanted to tell her about Mrs. Dodds and the three old ladies with the yarn, but I thought it would sound stupid.**

** She pursed her lips. She knew I was holding back, but she didn't push me.**

** "I have a surprise for you," she said. "We're going to the beach."**

"Montauk!" Smiles lit up all of our faces. Our grandma (and apparently grandpa) went there, our father and mother, and then us. It was one of our favorite places in the whole world. Alex and Elizabeth _loved_ the ocean, and Dad would take them underwater and teach them all kinds of things. For me and Sarah, who couldn't breathe underwater like they could, Mom would take us on long walks on the beach and then when we found a suitable spot, we would sit and she would draw buildings in the sand. The drawings had so much detail I thought they would just pop off the page and tower above us. Then, when we were all together, our parents would train us with swords, bow and arrows, knives, the works. They would teach us strategy (Mom mostly, Dad just liked to go in there guns (swords?) blazing) and fighting techniques.

** My eyes widened. "Montauk?"**

** "Three nights – same cabin."**

** "When?"**

** She smiled. "As soon as I get changed."**

** I couldn't believe it. My mom and I hadn't been to Montauk the last two summers, because Gabe said there wasn't enough money.**

** Gabe appeared in the doorway and growled. "Bean dip, Sally? Didn't you hear me?"**

** I wanted to punch him, but I met my mom's eyes and I understood she was offering me a deal: be nice to Gabe for a little while. Just until she was ready to leave for Montauk. Then we would get out of here.**

** "I was on my way, honey," she told Gabe. "We were just talking about the trip."**

** Gabe's eyes got small. "The trip? You mean you were serious about that?"**

"Of course she was!" Elizabeth exclaimed.

** "I knew it," I muttered. "He won't let us go."**

** "Of course he will," my mom said evenly. "Your step-father is just worried about money. That's all. Besides," she added, "Gabriel won't have to settle for bean dip. I'll make him enough seven-layer dip for the whole weekend. Guacamole. Sour cream. The works."**

"Ooh, nicely done, grandma," Alex chuckled.

** Gabe softened a bit. "So this money for your trip...it comes out of your clothes budget, right?"**

"No! Not the clothes budget!" Sarah gasped. Jeez, you would think she's a child of Aphrodite...

** "Yes, honey," my mother said.**

** "And you won't take my car anywhere but there and back."**

** "We'll be very careful."**

** Gabe scratched his double chin. "Maybe if you hurry with that seven-layer dip...And maybe if the kid apologizes for interrupting my poker game."**

** Maybe if I kick you in your soft spot, I thought. And make you sing soprano for a week.**

We couldn't stop laughing. The way our father's mind worked sometimes...

"Why didn't he!? That would've been amazing!" Alex gasped after he finished laughing.

"And probably would result in Gabe not letting them go, Dad being grounded by Gabe, and maybe something really bad happening with Dad's abilities. But yes, that would've been...freaking...awesome." Sarah giggled.

** But my mom's eyes warned me not to make him mad.**

** Why did she put up with this guy? I wanted to scream. Why did she care what he thought?**

** "I'm sorry," I muttered. "I'm really sorry I interrupted your incredibly important poker game. Please go back to it right now."**

"Sarcasm. It's a wonderful tool." Alex smirked.

** Gabe's eyes narrowed. His tiny brain was probably trying to detect sarcasm in my statement.**

** "Yeah, whatever," he decided.**

** He went back to his game.**

** "Thank you, Percy," my mom said. "Once we get to Montauk, we'll take more about...whatever you've forgotten to tell me, okay?"**

** For a moment, I thought I saw anxiety in her eyes – the same fear I'd seen in Grover during the bus ride – as if my mom too felt an odd chill in the air.**

** But then her smile returned, and I figured I must have been mistaken. She ruffled my hair and went to make Gabe his seven-layer bean dip.**

** An hour later we were ready to leave.**

** Gabe took a break from his poker game long enough to watch me**

"Watch him? Not even help?" I chided.

"I think we all know he's a jerk." Elizabeth stated, biting into a chocolate bar from the candy bag.

**lug my mom's bags to the car. He kept griping and groaning about losing her cooking - and more important, his '78 Camaro – for the whole weekend.**

** "Not a scratch on this car, brain boy," he warned me as I loaded the last bag. "Not one little scratch."**

"Oh...so a twelve year old is going to drive?" Alex scoffed. I looked at him curiously.

"What?" He asked.

** Like I'd be the one driving. I was twelve.**

"Stop reading Dad's mind. That's scary." I said.

"Coincidence." He waved his hand in dismissal.

** But that didn't matter to Gabe. If a seagull so much as pooped on his paint job, he'd find a way to blame me.**

** Watching him lumber back toward the apartment building, I got so made I did something I can't explain. As Gabe reached the doorway, I made the hand gesture I'd seen Grover make on the bus, a sort of warding-off-evil gesture, a clawed hand over my heart, then a shoving movement toward Gabe. The screen door slammed shut so hard it whacked him in the butt and sent him flying up the staircase as if he'd been shot from a cannon. Maybe it was just eh wind, or some freak accident with the hinges, but I didn't stay long enough to find out.**

** I got in the Camaro and told my mom to step on it.**

"I wish I could've seen that!" Sarah giggled.

"I don't think he's even small enough to fit in a cannon!" Elizabeth laughed. We all stared at her for a moment...then burst out laughing.

** Our rental cabin was on the south shore, way out at the tip of Long Island. It was a little pastel box with faded curtains, half sunken into the dunes. There was always sand in the sheets and spiders in the cabinets, and most of the time the sea was too cold to swim in.**

** I loved the place.**

"So do we." We replied.

** We'd been going there since I was a baby. My mom had been going even longer. She never exactly said, but I knew why the beach was special to her. It was the place where she'd met my dad.**

** As we got closer to Montauk, she seemed to grow younger, years of worry and work disappearing from her face. Her eyes turned the color of the sea.**

** We got there at sunset, opened all the cabin's windows, and went through our usual cleaning routine. We walked on the beach, fed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and munched on blue jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy, and all the other free samples my mom had brought from work.**

** I guess I should explain the blue food.**

Elizabeth giggled and waved a blue saltwater taffy in the air.

** See, Gabe had once told my mom there was no such thing.**

"Is he stupid?" I muttered.

"Yep." My siblings replied.

** They had this fight, which seemed like a really small thing at the time. But ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue. She backed blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought him blue candy from the shop. This – along with keeping her maiden name, Jackson, rather than calling herself Mrs. Ugliano**

"Ewww. Still the grossest name ever." Sarah stuck out her tongue in disgust.

** – was proof that she wasn't totally suckered by Gabe. She did have a rebellious streak, like me.**

** When it got dark, we made a fire. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. Mom told me stories about when she was a kid, back before her parents died in the plane crash. She told me about the books she wanted to write someday, when she had enough money to quit the candy shop.**

** Eventually, I got up the nerve to ask about what was always on my mind whenever we came to Montauk – my father. Mom's eyes went all misty. I figured she would tell me the same things she always did, but I never got tired of hearing them.**

"I miss grandpa," Alex sighed. We all did. While the gods were able to come and go more frequently now, we rarely saw our grandfather. He either had some...godly business to do or something like that. We normally saw him at Camp Half-Blood, but he also tried his very best to come to all our birthdays and other celebrations.

** "He was kind, Percy," she said. "Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, too. You have his black hair, you know, and his green eyes."**

** Mom fished a blue jelly bean out of her candy bag. "I wish he could see you, Percy. He would be so proud."**

** I wondered how she could say that. What was so great about me? A dyslexic, hyperactive boy with a D+ report card, kicked out of school for the sixth time in six years.**

"You're pretty great Dad..." Elizabeth smiled. There were so many great things about our father...so many. It was sad that back then he didn't realize that fact.

** "How old was I?" I asked. "I mean...when he left?"**

** She watched the flames. "He was only with me for one summer, Percy. Right here at this beach. This cabin."**

** "But...he knew me as a baby."**

** "No, honey. He knew I was expecting a baby, but he never saw you. He had to leave before you were born."**

** I tried to square that with the fact that I seemed to remember...something about my father. A warm glow. A smile.**

"He visited. That's probably why. I think a god can get into an apartment without a mortal knowing." Alex sighed.

** I had always assumed he knew me as a baby. My mom had never said it outright, but still, I'd felt it must be true. Now, to be told that he'd never even seen me...**

** I felt angry at my father. Maybe it was stupid, but I resented him for going on that ocean voyage, for not having the guts to marry my mom. He'd left us, and now we were stuck with Smelly Gabe.**

** "Are you going to send me away again?" I asked her. "To another boarding school?"**

** She pulled a marshmallow from the fire.**

** "I don't know, honey." Her voice was heavy. "I think...I think we'll have to do something."**

** "Because you don't want me around?" I regretted the words as soon as they were out.**

** My mom's eyes welled with tears. She took my hand, squeezed it tight. "Oh, Percy, no. I – I **_**have**_** to, honey. For your own good. I have to send you away."**

Her words made me even more thankful that I had two parents that I could be with, almost twenty four/seven.

** Her words reminded me of what Mr. Brunner had said – that it was best for me to leave Yancy.**

** "Because I'm not normal," I said.**

** "You say that as if it's a bad thing, Percy. But you don't realize how important you are. I thought Yancy Academy would be far enough away. I thought you'd finally be safe."**

** "Safe from what?"**

** She met my eyes, and a flood of memories came back to me – all the weird, scary things that had ever happened to me, some of which I'd tried to forget.**

** During third grade, a man in a black trench coat had stalked me on the playground. When the teachers threatened to call the police, he went away growling, but no one believed me when I told them that under his broad-brimmed hat, the man only had one eye, right in the middle of his head.**

"A Cyclops?" Elizabeth asked.

"Yeah...could grandpa have been checking up on him?" Sarah directed her question toward Alex.

"No idea. Grandpa works in mysterious ways...heck, Dad works in mysterious ways." He said.

** Before that – a really early memory. I was in preschool, and a teacher accidentally put me down for a nap in a cot that s snake had slithered into. My mom screamed when she came to pick me up and found me playing with a limp, scaly rope I'd somehow managed to strangle to death with my meaty toddler hands.**

"How could the teacher miss a snake!?" Sarah said.

"It's pretty easy to do, remember when that Gardner snake got into your room through the window?" I shot at her. Her face went pale and she threw a small pillow at me.

"That was not funny. That thing was huge,"

"And harmless." Alex snickered.

"I just do not like snakes, okay?" She huffed. Alex suddenly got a devious look on his face.

"Hey, Sarah," he started.

"Yes?" she narrowed her eyes at him.

"There's a spider on your leg."

"WHAT!?" Sarah leaped from the couch and started jumping and down. "Get it off, get it off, get it off!"

Alex and I were laughing our heads off and even Elizabeth with giggling.

"Sarah! There's no spider!" I said between laughs. She stopped jumping and looked around. After she was sure that really was no spider she sent a death glare toward Alex.

"That...was not funny. You _know_ I'm terrified of spiders. Genetics!" She pointed toward the sky.

"Sorry, it was just too good to pass up!" He chuckled. I wasn't as scared of spiders as Sarah was, but I definitely didn't like them...

** In every single school, something creepy had happened, something unsafe, and I was forced to move.**

** I knew I should tell my mom about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds at the art museum, about my weird hallucination that I had sliced my math teacher into dust with a sword. But I couldn't make myself tell her. I had a strange feeling the news would end our trip to Montauk, and I didn't want that.**

** "I've tried to keep you as close to me as I could," my mom said. "They told me that was a mistake. But there's only one other option, Percy – the place your father wanted to send you. And I just...I just can't stand to do it."**

** "My father wanted me to go to a special school?"**

"A camp," I corrected.

** "Not a school," she said softly. "A summer camp."**

"See? Now you're doing it," Alex pointed out.

** My head was spinning. Why would my dad – who hadn't even stayed around long enough to see me born – talk to my mom about a summer camp? And if it was so important, why hadn't she ever mentioned it before?**

** "I'm sorry, Percy," she said, seeing the look in my eyes. "But I can't talk about it. I - I couldn't send you to that place. It might mean saying good-bye to you for good."**

** "For good? But if it's only a summer camp..."**

** She turned toward the fire, and I knew from her expression that if I asked her any more questions she would start to cry.**

** That night I had a vivid dream.**

** It was storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse and a golden eagle, were trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf. The eagle swooped down and slashed the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The horse reared up and kicked at the eagle's wings. As they fought, the ground rumbled, and a monstrous voice chuckled somewhere beneath the earth, goading the animals to fight harder.**

** I ran toward them, knowing I had to stop them from killing each other, but I was running in slow motion. I knew I would be too late. I saw the eagle dive down, its beak aimed at the horse's wide eyes, and I screamed, **_**No!**_

** I woke with a start.**

"Well, that could be something..." Sarah trailed.

"But what?" Elizabeth asked. Sarah thought for a moment.

"I got nothing."

"That's a first." Alex mumbled. Now the pillow was thrown at him.

** Outside, it really was storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.**

** With the next thunderclap, my mom woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, "Hurricane."**

** I knew that was crazy. Long Island never sees hurricanes this early in the summer. But the ocean seemed to have forgotten. Over the roar of the wind, I heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made my hair stand on end.**

** Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice –someone yelling, pounding on our cabin door.**

"Grover?" Elizabeth asked.

** My mother sprang out of bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock. **

** Grover stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he wasn't...he wasn't exactly Grover. **

"Knew it." Elizabeth sighed, content that she had assumed correctly.

** "Searching all night," he gasped. "What were you thinking?"**

** My mother looked at me in terror – not scared of Grover, but of why he'd come. **

** "Percy," she said, shouting to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?"**

** I was frozen, looking at Grover. I couldn't understand what I was seeing. **

** "**_**O Zeu kai alloi theoi!**_**" he yelled. "It's right behind me! Didn't you **_**tell**_** her?"**

Alex gasped. "Grover...that is not nice language." Alex may not be completely fluent in reading English...but give him Greek and he could read and write it backwards and upside down.

** I was too shocked to register that he'd just cursed in Ancient Greek, and I'd understood him perfectly. I was too shocked to wonder how Grover had gotten her by himself in the middle of the night. Because Grover didn't have his pants on – and where his legs should be...where his legs should be...**

** My mom looked at my sternly and talked in a tone she'd never used before: "**_**Percy.**_** Tell me **_**now**_**!"**

** I stammered something about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds, and my mom stared at me, her face deathly pale in the flashes of lightning.**

** She grabbed her purse, tossed me my rain jacket, and said, "Get to the car. Both of you. **_**Go!**_**"**

** Grover ran for the Camaro – but he wasn't running, exactly. He was trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs made sense to me. I understood how he could run so fast and still limp when he walked.**

** Because where his feet should be, there were no feet. There were cloven hooves.**

"I remember when we found out Grover was a satyr. That was the freakiest experience of my life..." I trailed.

"Half man, half goat!" Elizabeth clarified.

"And don't ever call them half donkey..." Alex chuckled. I glanced at the clock.

"I think we can fit in one more chapter before lunch...who wants to read?"

**Okay...so here's a quick little question. Should I have Elizabeth or Alex read the next chapter? Because I said I was going to have every child read a chapter, but she is five and I don't think she'd be quite fluent enough to read at that level. Not saying that all five year olds can't read at that level, heck, I could make Elizabeth one of those kids that can read at excessively good rates. However, I do have an idea for Alex reading the next chapter that's been nagging at the back of my head. If I do Elizabeth next chapter, I will do Alex the one after that and put in my idea, but I just wanted to know if you guys wanted to hear Elizabeth read. Thanks! I hope there was more dialogue this time! R&R! **


	5. Nana's an Expert Bullfighter

**Okay, so I decided to have Alex read the next chapter because it just makes more logical sense. I might have a chapter in Elizabeth's POV but I won't have her read. XD So, thanks for all the reviews! Toward the end the dialogue between the kids gets a little scarce because I had trouble thinking of things for the kids to say. But! There's a big chunk of this that isn't reading at all, so I think that makes up for it. **** Plus the fact that I haven't uploaded in such a long time and I feel really bad...**

**Alex's POV**

"I'll read next," I held my hand out for the book. Justin tossed it over to me just as Elizabeth threw a blue jelly bean at me.

"Whoops. Sorry, big brother." She giggled. I rolled my eyes and smiled then popped the blue jelly bean in my mouth. I reopened the book to chapter four.

"My mother teaches me bullfighting?" I questioned.

"Awesome." Justin grinned. I smirked myself and started the chapter.

**We tore through the night along dark county roads. Wind slammed against the Camaro. Rain lashed the windshield. I didn't know how my mom could see anything, but she kept her foot on the gas.**

** Every time there was a flash of lightning, I looked at Grover sitting next to me in the backseat and I wondered if I'd gone insane, or if he was wearing some kind of shag-carpet pants.**

"Who on earth would wear shag-carpet pants?" Sarah's face scrunched in disgust.

"They are actually very fashionable to some people." Justin argued.

"To you?"

"Well...no, not really. But hey, there are people who enjoy different things."

We all just looked at him. When we didn't say anything he just sighed and muttered, "Keep reading."

** But, no, the smell was one I remembered from kindergarten field trips to the petting zoo – lanolin, like from wool. The smell of a wet barnyard animal.**

"Like the sheep!" Elizabeth exclaimed with a large smile on her face. Every year our parents take her to the zoo, only because she likes to look at and pet the sheep. One year, however, it was raining on the day they were supposed to take her. She was sad, but didn't throw a tantrum like we thought she would. But my father felt so bad that they took her anyway and my dad made sure to keep most of the water off of her. When they got back, our mom described how bad every single animal smelled...including our dad. We all got a good laugh out of that one except Dad, who proceeded to splash the dishwater in our mother's face.

** All I could think to say was, "So, you and my mom...know each other?"**

** Grover's eyes flitted to the rearview mirror, though there were no cars behind us. "Not exactly," he said. "I mean, we've never met in person. But she knew I was watching you."**

"That's...creepy." I muttered.

"They were only watching him to keep him safe." Sarah pointed out.

"Yeah...but still creepy."

** "Watching me?"**

** "Keeping tabs on you. Making sure you were okay. But I wasn't faking being your friend," he added hastily. "I **_**am**_ **your friend."**

** "Um...what **_**are**_** you, exactly?"**

** "That doesn't matter right now."**

** "It doesn't matter? From the waist down, my best friend is a donkey – "**

** Grover let out a sharp, throaty "**_**Blaa-ha-ha!**_**" **

I couldn't help it. I burst out in chuckles and soon we were all laughing hysterically. Our father always called Grover the "donkey" and Grover now comes back with "goldfish." It was an inside joke between the two of them that never grew old.

**I'd heard him make that sound before, but I'd always assumed it was a nervous laugh. Now I realized it was more of an irritated bleat.**

** "Goat!" he cried.**

** "What?"**

** "I'm a **_**goat**_** from the waist down."**

** "You just said it didn't matter."**

** "**_**Blaa-ha-ha!**_** There are satyrs who would trample you underhoof for such an insult!"**

"But Uncle Grover didn't trample me when I called him a donkey...?" Elizabeth trailed. When she was very young and could first remember names and faces she had called Grover a donkey.

"You were young and didn't know the difference. Besides, he loves you a lot more than he loves Dad," Sarah chuckled.

** "Whoa. Wait. Satyrs. You mean like...Mr. Brunner's myths?"**

** "Were those old ladies at the fruit stand a **_**myth**_**, Percy? Was Mrs. Dodds a myth?"**

** "So you **_**admit**_** there was a Mrs. Dodds!"**

** "Of course."**

** "Then why – "**

** "The less you knew, the fewer monsters you'd attract," Grover said, like that should be perfectly obvious. "We put Mist over the humans' eyes. We hoped you'd think the Kindly One was a hallucination. But it was no good. You started to realize who you are."**

** "Who I – wait a minute, what do you mean?"**

My insides churned. I knew the feeling, as did my siblings. We knew the feeling of something crazy happening to us and not knowing why. We knew the feeling of not knowing who we were and what we were capable of. Our parents tried so hard to make our lives normal, and keep us away from danger. But there was always that chance...always that chance.

** The weird bellowing noise rose up again somewhere behind us, closer than before. Whatever was chasing us was still on our trail.**

** "Percy," my mom said, "there's too much to explain and not enough time. We have to get you to safety."**

** "Safety from what? Who's after me?"**

** "Oh, nobody much," Grover said, obviously still miffed about the donkey comment. "Just the Lord of the Dead and a few of his blood-thirstiest minions."**

"That...is utterly terrifying..." Justin shuddered.

** "Grover!"**

** "Sorry, Mrs. Jackson. Could you drive faster, please?"**

** I tried to wrap my mind around what was happening, but I couldn't do it. I knew this wasn't a dream. I had no imagination. I could never dream up something this weird.**

We didn't have to dream. It was our reality. Our wonderful, adventurous, action-packed, dangerous reality. And I wouldn't change it for the world.

** My mom made a hard left. We swerved onto a narrower road, racing past darkened farmhouses and wooded hills and **_**PICK YOUR OWN STRAWBERRIES**_** sings on white picket fences.**

** "Where are we going?" I asked.**

** "The summer camp I told you about." My mother's voice was tight; she was trying for my sake not to be scared. "The place your father wanted to send you." **

"Camp Half-Blood!" Elizabeth exclaimed. We were told never to speak the name aloud if we didn't have to. Names were a sacred thing in our... "culture." However, we didn't listen to that rule. We called everything by what it was really named because we didn't want to feel stupid. Because we wanted to feel like we were in control, and most of the time...we were.

"Yes, Elizabeth," I laughed. "Camp Half-Blood."

If anyone loved that place, it was her. She loved to run around camp wielding a dagger and eat in a the large lunch pavilion with all the other campers. We all loved camp, especially me. I had been going there the longest and felt a strong connection with the place, quite like my father does. It was like our second home, and for a summer camp, that was pretty good.

** "The place you didn't want me to go."**

** "Please, dear," my mother begged. "This is hard enough. Try to understand. You're in danger."**

** "Because some old ladies cut yarn."**

"Yeah, they cut some yarn that could alter your future...forever." Justin stated in a monotonous voice. We knew what the yarn meant...what we didn't know was what it meant to Dad.

** "Those weren't old ladies," Grover said. "Those were the Fates. Do you know what it means –the fact they appeared in front of you? They only do that when you're about to...when someone's about to die."**

** "Whoa. You said 'you.'" **

** "No I didn't. I said 'someone.'"**

** "You meant 'you.' As in **_**me**_**."**

** "I meant **_**you**_**, like 'someone." Not you, **_**you**_**."**

"It's funny how they still have fights like that today," Sarah mused.

"Yes, but not about Dad dying." I scoffed.

"There have been a couple...but that's when Uncle Grover was _threatening_ to kill Dad..."

** "Boys!" my mom said.**

** She pulled the wheel hard to the right, and I got a glimpse of a figure she'd swerved to avoid – a dark fluttering shape now lost behind us in the storm.**

** "What was that?"**

** "We're almost there," my mother said, ignoring my question. "Another mile. Please. Please. Please."**

** I didn't know where **_**there**_** was, but I found myself leaning forward in the car, anticipating, wanting us to arrive. **

** Outside, nothing but rain and darkness – the kind of empty countryside you get way out on the tip of Long Island. I thought about Mrs. Dodds and the moment when she'd changed into the thing with pointed teeth and leathery wings. My limbs went numb from delayed shock. She really **_**hadn't**_** been human. She'd meant to kill me.**

"Well, isn't that a happy thought." I shivered. And I thought my pre-algebra teacher hated me.

** Then I thought about Mr. Brunner...and the sword he had thrown me. Before I could ask Grover about that, the hair rose on the back of my neck. There was a blinding flash, a jaw-rattling **_**boom**_**!, and our car exploded.**

** I remember feeling weightless, like I was being crushed, fried, and hosed down all at the same time.**

"No!" Elizabeth yelled. "Daddy!"

"He's alright," Justin soothed. "He's alright."

** I peeled my forehead off the back of the driver's seat and said, "Ow."**

** "Percy!" my mom shouted.**

** "I'm okay..."**

** I tried to shake off the daze. I wasn't dead. The car hadn't really exploded. We'd swerved into a ditch. Our driver's-side doors were wedged in the mud. The roof had cracked open like an eggshell and rain was pouring in.**

** Lightning. That was the only explanation. We'd been blasted right off the road. Next to me in the backseat was a big motionless lump. "Grover!"**

** He was slumped over, blood trickling from the side of this mouth. I shook his furry hip, thinking, No! Even if you are half barnyard animal, you're my best friend and I don't want you to die!**

Half barnyard animal...wouldn't Grover get a good kick out of that one.

** Then he groaned, "Food," and I knew there was hope.**

"Yep. Sounds like Uncle Grover." Sarah giggled.

** "Percy," my mother said, "we have to..." Her voice faltered.**

** I looked back. In a flash of lightning, through the mud-spattered rear windshield, I saw a figure lumbering toward us on the shoulder of the road. The sight of it made my skin crawl. It was a dark silhouette of a huge guy, like a football player. He seemed to be holding a blanket over his head. His top half was bulky and fuzzy. His upraised hands made it look like he hda ... ha...**_**had**_**...hro...**

I couldn't help it. The words started to blur and run together. The three "H's" had made me screw up my reading.

"Dammit." I threw the book down.

"What's wrong?"

"Dyslexia..." I stated. Sarah looked sadly at me. My dyslexia had gotten better, but it wasn't completely gone. And I hated it. Absolutely. Hated. It. Apparently, the hate was evident on my face.

"Maybe we should take a break. We can eat lunch and then come back to the chapter." Justin suggested, standing and stretching his legs.

"Yeah! How about Mac and Cheese!"

"Elizabeth, you had Mac and Cheese yesterday," Sarah reminded her.

"Yep! And the day before that, too! I'm on a roll!" And with that she ran to the kitchen to start boiling water.

"I'd better go help her..." Sarah groaned and practically rolled off the couch and into the kitchen.

"You want anything?" Justin asked, his remorseful eyes staring down at me as I still sat on the floor.

"No. I'm not hungry." I said.

"Alright," He swallowed and meandered after our sisters. After he was out of sight, I picked up the book again and tried to read again. **...it look like he had horns.**

Of course. _Now_, I get it.

Suddenly, my phone started vibrating next to my foot. I lifted it up and looked at the screen. _Dad. _

__Oh boy. I sighed and accepted the call.

"Hello?"

"Hey, kiddo. Just calling to make sure everything's okay,"

"Yeah. We're fine." I clipped.

"Whoa. That didn't sound too "fine." What happened?" He asked worriedly. I groaned internally. I never liked talking to my father about my dyslexia problems. Not because he couldn't sympathize with me – because I thought I was getting better. I thought I'd be able to overcome the problem and now that I can't...I feel like I disappointed him in some way.

"It's nothing –"

"No, it's something, Alex," he switched into his authoritative tone. "What happened? Do we need to come home?"

"No! No...I just...I'm having a hard time...a hard time reading..."

"Oh..." Instantly his tone softened and I could practically see his face fall. "It's okay, buddy. Everyone like us has some severity of dyslexia, you know that."

"Yeah, but why do I have to have the worst version of it!" I exclaimed, throwing down the book.

"Son, I had a horrible time with it when I was younger, too. Heck, I still have trouble from time to time. It gets better with age. Your brain is hardwired to read Greek, not English."

"I can fight monsters, name every Greek and Roman god there is and yet I can barely read?"

"Pretty much. And since when have you fought monsters?" His tone suddenly became suspicious and I chuckled. My parents were strictly against us fighting monsters until we had been sufficiently trained. I had _trained_ for quests, but I have never gone on one. Someday...someday...

"I haven't been fighting any lately, Dad. Just an example,"

"Good. What were you reading, anyway?"

I looked down at the green colored book on the floor. We had promised not to tell...but would he really want to know?

"Um...just one of my textbooks," I lied.

"What? You're doing homework? Are you sure you're okay?"

"Yes, Dad." I laughed. "Just studying for finals."

"Now I know you're not okay. Are you running a temp?" I laughed at my Dad's fruitful attempts to cheer me up. Whenever I felt down, he always either made fun of me if it was a minor thing, or really sympathized and hugged me and didn't let go when it was serious. The problem was, I thought this was serious. He didn't.

"No, I'm fine. We're all fine. How's camp?"

"Oh, same old, same old. It looks exactly the same since the first time I came here."

I suddenly tried to imagine what he thought of the camp when he first arrived and as I looked down at the book...I realized that I didn't have to imagine. I could just read.

"How's Chiron?"

"Good, good. What?" Suddenly, the called off to someone in the distance. They had a brief conversation I couldn't quite hear and then he shifted back to me.

" I've got to go kiddo, but I'll see you soon, okay?"

"Dad, you just left...today."

"So? A week isn't that long. I will see you soon." He said it very pointingly and slowly and I realized that he was just trying to make sure that I felt better about not being able to read. I smiled.

"Yeah. See you soon."

"Your mother says hi and that she loves you. Oh wait, here – "

"I love you kids!" I heard my mom yell.

"Tell her we love her, too," I snickered.

"They love you, too! Always have, always will!" He added after he came back to me. "Love you, kiddo. Keep trying, okay?"

"I will. Love you, too, Dad. Be careful."

"You, too. Bye."

"Bye." I hung up as the smell of burnt Mac and Cheese filled the room. Sarah came skidding in and almost fell over the couch.

"We...we had a bit of a...catastrophe."

"What happened?"

"We were messing around and we may have not been watching the pot and it kind of...overflowed." I rolled my eyes and went to help.

Our kitchen, to say it nicely, was a mess. _Overflowed_ was an understatement. More like, _exploded_.

Cheese covered the stove and the floor and wall around it while my siblings stood with bits of noodles and cheese dripping off of them. I sighed and texted Dad,

_What gets cheese off of walls?_

I had barely gotten the dish rag when I got a reply.

_Can't leave you alone for two seconds can I?_

_ It wasn't me! It was Sarah, honest!_

_ One, tell Elizabeth she really shouldn't be having Mac and Cheese again, she'll get sick of it. And two, tell Sarah that she has to watch the pot next time. Three, tell Justin that I trust him to watch his siblings and you...just clean it up. Use the soap under the sink and try not to strip the paint off...and don't tell Mom._

I shook my head and threw dishrags at my frozen siblings.

"Well? This mess isn't going to clean itself up."

Once the kitchen was...somewhat...clean, we headed back to the living room. Sarah was still pulling noodles out of her hair, and Justin was trying to scrape dry cheese off his face. Elizabeth actually came out almost unscathed, but you could tell that she wouldn't be making Mac and Cheese for a while.

"So...who wants to read?" I asked.

"You should." Justin blurted.

"What?"

"I just..I mean...it was only...you should." He slunk back into the fluffy chair. I knew what he meant, he wanted me to try again. Just like Dad did. I smiled and opened the book back up. I took a deep breath and tried not to focus on my siblings watching me. Then I read.

** I swallowed hard. "Who is – "**

** "Percy," my mother said, deadly serious. "Get out of the car."**

"I don't think I've ever heard of our grandmother being 'deadly serious'," Justin stated.

"What about that time when Dad played that April Fools prank and called saying that he had broken every bone in his body and she had to come take care of him for a couple months?" Sarah reminded him.

"Oh yeah...I forgot about that," Justin chuckled.

** My mother threw herself against the driver's-side door. It was jammed shut in the mud. I tried mine. Stuck too. I looked up desperately at the hole in the roof. It might've been an exit, but the edges were sizzling and smoking.**

"That sounds scary..." Elizabeth grabbed a pillow and snuggled deeper in the side of the couch.

** "Climb out the passenger's side!" my mother told me. "Percy – you have to run. Do you see that big tree?"**

** "**_**What**_**?"**

** Another flash of lightning, and through the smoking hole in the roof I saw the tree she meant: a huge, White House Christmas tree – sized pine at the crest of the nearest hill.**

"I can't wait to see that tree again...it's always the first thing we see when we get to camp." Sarah smiled.

** "That's the property line," my mom said. "Get over that hill and you'll see a big farmhouse down in the valley. Run and don't look back. Yell for help. Don't stop until you reach the door."**

** "Mom, you're coming too."**

** Her face was pale, her eyes as sad as when she looked at the ocean.**

** "No!" I shouted. "You **_**are**_** coming with me. Help me carry Grover."**

"Nana..." Elizabeth whispered. We all felt it, too. Our grandmother meant everything to us...to see her get hurt, or worse...

"Keep reading." Sarah ordered, a set determination lacing her voice. I nodded.

** "Food!" Grover moaned, a little louder.**

** The man with the blanket on his head kept coming toward us, making his grunting, snorting noises. As he got closer, I realized he **_**couldn't**_** be holding a blanket over his head, because his hands – huge meaty hands – were swinging at his sides. There was no blanket. Meaning the bulky, fuzzy mass that was too big to be his head...was his head. And the points that looked like horns...**

"That's dreadful. Why are monsters always dreadful?" Justin shook his head and curled up with a pillow on the chair.

"Because they're monsters...I'm pretty sure all monsters are dreadful." I said.

"But why do _all_ of them have to be dreadful. I'm sure if I was suddenly turned into a monster I wouldn't be dreadful."

"These guys weren't _turned_ into monsters, Justin. They were born as monsters, there's a difference." Sarah sighed, exasperated. I could tell she was frustrated with the fact that her brothers were even discussing this and wanted me to get on with the story.

"Yeah, but – "

"Going on!" Sarah glared at me and I quickly brought my eyes back down to the book.

** "He doesn't want **_**us**_**," my mother told me. "He wants you. Besides, I can't cross the property line."**

** "But..."**

** "We don't have time, Percy. Go. Please."**

** I got mad, then - mad at my mother, at Grover the goat, and the thing with horns that was lumbering toward us slowly and deliberately like, like a bull.**

** I climbed across Grover and pushed the door open into the rain. "We're going together. Come on, Mom."**

** "I told you – "**

** "Mom! I am not leaving you. Help me with Grover."**

** I didn't wait for her answer. I scrambled outside, dragging Grover from the car. He was surprisingly light, but I couldn't have carried him very far if my mom hadn't come to my aid.**

** Together, we draped Grover's arms over our shoulders and started stumbling uphill through wet waist-high grass. **

Man, that had to be difficult. Grover was a heavy man, not that he was fat or anything. He was just very...sturdy.

** Glancing back, I got my first clear look at the monster. He was seven feet tall, easy, his arms and legs like something from the cover of **_**Muscle Man**_** magazine – bulging biceps and triceps and a bunch of other 'ceps, all stuffed like baseballs under vein-webbed skin. He wore no clothes except underwear – I mean, bright white Fruit of the Looms – which would've looked funny, except that the top half of his body was so scary. Coarse brown hair started at about his belly bottom and got thicker as it reached his shoulders.**

"So...gross." Sarah shuddered.

"Aww, you wouldn't want to kiss the terrifying, hairy, almost naked monster?" I joked. I got a pillow in my face as an answer. "That probably would make him feel bad."

"I would never _kiss_ a monster. I don't think any girl would. Which is why I'm surprised that any girl would kiss you."

I glared. I had had one girlfriend in my life, and she and I had been pretty much tied to the hip. We started dating three years ago and everything was perfect. And then one day, her family got up and left and I didn't even get to say goodbye. We texted and called, but it just wasn't the same without seeing each other every day. Then, we broke it off. _No, _I winced. _She_ broke it off. Ever since then, I hadn't felt okay dating another girl. So, I stayed away from dating.

I think Sarah could tell that she had hit a sore spot.

"Sorry. I thought you were over her?"

"I was. I _am," _I corrected myself quickly. It had been two years since she broke up with me, when we were both fourteen. The fact that I had had a girlfriend at twelve may seem weird, but the relationship didn't start getting serious until we turned thirteen. When she broke up with me...I was a wreck. I wouldn't come out of my room and Sarah had to take my phone away and delete her number so that I would stop constantly trying to call her. Now that I was sixteen, I thought the whole ordeal would seem silly to me, I mean, she was just a childhood crush, right? Apparently, my heart didn't think so.

"What was her name, again?" Elizabeth asked.

"...Amy."

"Oh. Right."

It was silent for a moment, then I cleared my throat and started reading again.

** His neck was a mass of muscle and fur leading up to his enormous head, which had a snout as long as my arm, snotty nostrils with a gleaming brass ring, cruel black eyes, and horns – enormous black-and-white horns with points you just couldn't get from an electric sharpener.**

** I recognized the monster, all right. He had been in one of the first stories Mr. Brunner told us. But he couldn't be real.**

** I blinked the rain out of my eyes. "That's – "**

"Minotaur." Justin whispered. We all nodded. The Minotaur was a nasty bugger and the only person I had ever heard of killing one was my father.

** "Pasiphae's son," my mother said. "I wish I'd known how badly they want to kill you."**

** "But he's the Min – "**

** "Don't say his name," she warned. "Names have power."**

** The pine tree was still way too far – a hundred yards uphill at least.**

** I glanced behind me again.**

** The bull-man hunched over our car, looking in the windows – or not looking, exactly. More like snuffling, nuzzling. I wasn't sure why he bothered, since we were only about fifty feet away.**

** "Food?" Grover moaned.**

** "Shhh," I told him. "Mom, what's he doing? Doesn't he see us?"**

** "His sight and hearing are terrible," she said.**

Thank goodness for that. Or they all might have been dead already.

** "He goes by smell. But he'll figure out where we are soon enough."**

** As if on cue, the bull-man bellowed in rage. He picked up Gabe's Camaro by the torn roof, the chassis creaking and groaning. He raised the car over his head and threw it down the road. It slammed into the wet asphalt and skidded in a shower of sparks for about half a mile before coming to a stop. The gas tank exploded.**

_**Not a scratch**_**, I remembered Gabe saying.**

I snorted. "Way to go, Dad."

** Oops.**

** "Percy," my mom said. "When he sees us, he'll charge. Wait until the last second, then jump out of the way – directly sideways. He can't change direction very well once he's charging. Do you understand?"**

** "How do you know all this?"**

** "I've been worried about an attack for a long time. I should have expected this. I was selfish, keeping you near me."**

** "Keeping me near you? But-"**

** Another bellow of rage, and the bull-man started tromping uphill.**

** He'd smelled us.**

"I wonder how Daddy smelled to him?" Elizabeth asked, her little face scrunching up as she tried to imagine. That broke us. We all started laughing and then tension that had been in the room before eased. Leave it to our little sister to make us alright again. Then again, she had a knack for it, being how cute she was. Yes, it can go down the books that Alexander Jackson, at sixteen years old, called his little sister _cute._

** The pine tree was only a few more yards, but the hill was getting steeper and slicker, and Grover wasn't getting any lighter.**

** The bull-man closed in. Another few seconds and he'd be on top of us.**

** My mother must've been exhausted, but she shouldered Grover. "Go Percy! Separate! Remember what I said."**

** I didn't want to split up, but I had the feeling she was right – it was our only chance. I sprinted to the left, turned, and saw the creature bearing down on me. His black eyes glowed with hate. He reeked like rotten meat. **

** He lowered his head and charged, those razor-sharp horns aimed straight at my chest.**

I suddenly felt very, _ very_ scared and sad. It just hit me that if any of these attacks had...killed my father...

I don't what I would have done without him. Hell, I wouldn't even be here. But even now, there was always the possibility of something happening to him. The thought if he or our mother being taken away from us, from _me_, was...impossible to imagine. And it made want to do nothing more than call my Dad and tell him to come home so I could just hug him and Mom all night.

"Alex?" Sarah questioned.

"Oh, sorry. Blanked out there," I could tell she wanted to question me more, but I kept on reading.

** The fear in my stomach made me want to bolt, but that wouldn't work. I could never outrun this thing. So I held my ground, and at the last moment, I jumped to the side.**

** The bull-man stormed past like a freight train, then bellowed with frustration and turned, but not toward me this time, toward my mother, who was setting Grover down in the grass.**

** We'd reached the crest of the hill. Down the other side I could see a valley, just as my mother had said, and the lights of a farmhouse glowing yellow through the rain. But that was half a mile away. We'd never make it.**

** The bull-man grunted, pawing the ground. He kept eyeing my mother, who was now retreating slowly downhill, back toward the road, trying to lead the monster away from Grover.**

** "Run, Percy!" she told me. "I can't go any farther. Run!"**

** But I just stood there, frozen in fear, as the monster charged her. She tried to sidestep, as she'd told me to do, but the monster had learned his lesson. His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck as she tried to get away. He lifted her as she struggled, kicking and pummeling the air. **

** "Mom!" **

** She caught my eyes, managed to choke out one last word: "Go!" **

** Then, with an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around my mother's neck, and she dissolved before my eyes, melting into light, a shimmering golden form, as if she were a holographic projection. A blinding flash, and she was simply...gone.**

I dropped the book.

No one said a word and I could see the tears starting to stream down Elizabeth's face.

"Nana?..." Sarah quickly grabbed her and held her close.

"It's alright, she's alright. This was in the past, remember? And she's here now. Which means somehow Daddy saved her." This seemed to calm Elizabeth down enough that she didn't start sobbing, but that didn't make the truth any less real.

We could have never met our grandmother.

I now knew why our parents never wanted us to go on quests or fight monsters. Our Dad had seen his mother taken away by one and I can't imagine how many more friends and family members he had lost just because of a stupid monster. He had lost enough, he couldn't lose us, too.

"All these years...I had been so angry for them not letting us fight." I whispered. Sarah glanced at me, but didn't say anything.

"I know." Justin responded. I glanced at him, the tears in his eyes taking me by surprise. His ten year old face had seen and heard more than it probably should have at his age. I suddenly couldn't bear the thought of losing my brother or any of my siblings. I would die before any of them got injured on my watch. Sarah pulled Elizabeth to the floor and sat next to me while Justin quickly curled up on the floor next to us. We huddled together in a small ball as I, with shaky hands, picked the book up.

** "No!" **

** Anger replaced my fear. Newfound strength burned in my limbs – the same rush of energy I'd gotten when Mrs. Dodds grew talons.**

** The bull-man bore down on Grover, who lay helpless in the grass. The monster hunched over, snuffling my best friend, as if he were about to lift Grover up and make him dissolve too.**

** I couldn't allow that.**

** I stripped off my red rain jacket. **

** "Hey!" I screamed, waving the jacket, running to one side of the monster. "Hey, stupid! Ground beef!"**

** "Raaaarrrr!" The monster turned toward me, shaking his meaty fists.**

** I had an idea – a stupid idea, but better than no idea at all. I put my back to the big pine tree and waved my red jacket in front of the bull-man, thinking I'd jump out of the way at the last moment.**

** But it didn't happen like that.**

** The bull-man charged too fast, his arms out to grab me whichever way I tried to dodge.**

** Time slowed down.**

** My legs tensed. I couldn't jump sideways, so I leaped straight up, kicking off from the creature's head, using it as a springboard, turning in midair, and landing on his neck.**

"That's our Dad," Sarah whispered proudly.

** How did I do that? I didn't have time to figure it out. A millisecond later, the monster's head slammed into the tree and the impact nearly knocked my teeth out. **

** The bull-man staggered around, trying to shake me. I locked my arms around his horns to keep from being thrown. Thunder and lightning were still going strong. The rain was in my eyes. The smell of rotten meat burned my nostrils.**

** The monster shook himself around and bucked like a rodeo bull. He should have just backed up into the tree and smashed me flat, but I was starting to realize that this thing had only one gear: forward.**

** Meanwhile, Grover started groaning in the grass. I wanted to yell at him to shut up, but the way I was getting tossed around, if I opened my mouth I'd bit my own tongue off. **

** "Food!" Grover moaned.**

** The bull-man wheeled toward him, pawed the ground again, and got ready to charge. I thought about how he had squeezed the life out of my mother, made her disappear in a flash of light, and rage filled me like high-octane fuel. I got both hands around one horn and I pulled backward with all my might. The monster tensed, gave a surprised grunt, then –**_**snap!**_

** The bull-man screamed and flung me through the air. I landed flat on my back in the grass. My head smacked against a rock. When I sat up, my vision was blurry, but I had a horn in my hands, a ragged bone weapon the size of a knife.**

** The monster charged.**

** Without thinking, I rolled to one side and came up kneeling. As the monster barreled past, I drove the broken horn straight into his side, right up under his furry rib cage.**

"Ouch..." Justin muttered. I chuckled.

** The bull-man roared in agony. He failed, clawing at his chest, then began to disintegrate - not like my mother, in a flash of golden light, but like crumbling sand, blown away in chunks by the wind, the same way Mrs. Dodds had burst apart.**

** The monster was gone. **

** The rain had stopped. The storm still rumbled, but only in the distance. I smelled the livestock and my knees were shaking. My head felt like it was splitting open. I was weak and scared and trembling with grief. I'd just seen my mother vanish. I wanted to lie down and cry, but there was Grover, needing my help, so I managed to haul him up and stagger down the valley, toward the lights of the farmhouse. I was crying, calling for my mother, but I held onto Grover – I wasn't going to let him go. **

** The last thing I remember is collapsing on a wooden porch, looking up a ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around a yellow light, and the stern faces of a familiar-looking bearded man and a pretty girl, her blond hair curled like a princess's. **

"Mommy!" Elizabeth cried, her mood instantly lifted. Sarah and I grinned at each other. If there was any way our father could have described his soon to be wife, it would be, and I quote, "she always looked like a princess. The way her hair framed her face. So beautiful..." And he'd go on and on.

**They both looked down at me, and the girl said, "He's the one. He must be."**

** "Silence, Annabeth," the man said. "He's still conscious. Bring him inside."**

I closed the book and sat back on my hands.

And Elizabeth's stomach grumbled.

"Oh yeah..." she said, gently poking her tummy. "I never fed you."

I laughed, a real genuine laugh, and picked her up.

"Then let's go feed your tummy. I think it's a good spot to take a break anyway."

"Food!" She squealed.

"Yeah, I'm starving." Justin said as he whizzed by us and into the kitchen.

For now, everything was fine.

**Unknown POV**

I watched as the children walked into the kitchen to create the lunch that they had failed at before and chuckled. I couldn't wait for the boss to give me the order. These little rats had been causing enough trouble for us by just existing and with the mother and father gone...there wouldn't be a better opportunity. But, for now, I just kept watching their reactions as they read the book. At this I felt the cogs in my head turn. I didn't know where that book had come from, and neither did the boss. But that didn't matter. I just slunk back into the shadows.

And waited.

**Well? Sorry, I've been off doing...life...for a long time now. I hope this fulfills what you guys have been waiting for! I've decided that I'm going to write a chapter for each story I'm continuing, and creating, before I can write another chapter for any other story. That way, I don't get caught up in one story and forgetting the others, because that's just meant to the rest of them. They need love and care, too. As always, thank you for taking the time to read and please review! :)**


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